Ananse Tales

Long ago, all stories of the Akan people belonged to the sky god Nyankopong and were called "Nyankonsem," or sky-god stories. Nyankopong decided one day to sell his stories for a price: the buyer must bring to him a live python, a live lion, live bees, and a fairy (Mmoatia). He announced this to his chiefs and elders, but none of them even considered trying to meet the request because they assumed the sky-god had no real intent to sell his stories.

Read more...

Why the stories belong to Ananse

When the Ashanti people of West Africa started to tell their stories, they weren't called Ananse stories at first.


Ananse was just a spider with a limp who lived in the forest, and who was so insignificant and puny that no one paid him any attention.


In those days, Tiger was king and so the stories were called Tiger Stories.

Read more..

Who is to be blame

There lived a married couple who were so happy until they had a quarrel one night. But fortunately for the man, someone had promised him a job opportunity the next morning and will therefore have to wake up very early the next morning to see the one before he left for his current workplace.

Read more...

Land of the deaf

There once lived in a village by name Massa, a man called Samba. It happened that all the inhabitants of Massa were deaf. Samba, a shepherd, took his flock to the fields to graze everyday. One day when on the fields, Samba noticed that one of his sheep was not among the others.

Read more...